Here’s my take on the creation story: God’s way smarter than the us we are now, with thousands of years of scientific knowledge and innovation. So imagine how much wider that knowledge gap was when the Bible was first written down. It’s interesting that Jesus often told parables, to put spiritual concepts into human terms. I imagine God did the same thing in the OT; I honestly don’t know if the early Bible writers would’ve had the context to be able to grasp the Big Bang theory, if that is, in fact, the way the world started. What’s important to me about the Creation story is that God made it happen, which holds true for me with evolution too. Here’s my take on Jesus and whether or not he believed the creation story: It doesn’t matter to me. Everything he’s actually said in the NT seems to be spot-on to me, so I’m not so concerned with what he didn’t say. Although, again given back to his use of parables, I’d say that God could’ve chosen to give the human Jesus divine revelation about the creation story, the way he gave George Washington Carver divine revelation about the many uses for peanuts. God also could’ve given Jesus the word but told him not to share it, the same way he sometimes gives us words as believers that he doesnt’ want us to share. So that’s my way more than two cents.

I’m not sure where they get the idea that Jesus believed in a literal 6 day creation; they may just be pulling some 1neUpmanship.

I think that whatever Jesus did know, though, He knew correctly. Not that having wrong information is a sign of the fall or anything like that, but rather the stuff He knew attested to what He spoke. He says in John 5 that all the Son knows is because the Father taught him. He says that He says nothing of His own accord, but that which the Father wanted Him to say, that He says. He seems to have knowledge of how things would have panned out if God had acted differently and even have knowledge of how The Father would react if He asked a specific thing.

So even though, we can allow that Christ on earth may not have had the exact hour of His return, I think we can assume that He didn’t have inaccurate information as to when He would return. For example, He wouldn’t be thinking “Friday 1989″; He just wouldn’t have that information and wouldn’t speculate on it.

I don’t know if that robs Him of His humanity but I think what it does do is take His divinity seriously. We’ve never seen what the 100% combination of God and Man looks like before Christ; the fact that Jesus tears into creation and knows He was sent by God but doesn’t know exactly when He is coming back is mind boggling.

This is all short hand for saying that we can’t possibly know. LOL.

@ Paulette – Sounds good to me. Thanks!

@ Leigh – It says “No one knows when that day or hour will come-not the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father” so he didn’t know, not in his person as the Son. And I’m not saying that the creation story is a parable per se, but even if it is, and if it is taken to extremes, it serves a good purpose.

I don’t need proof that God is powerful, I know he is. I’ve never said he couldn’t create the world in six days if he so desires. The Jews celebrated the Sabbath because God said to. It’s reflected in the creation, but even if that’s not literal truth it doesn’t change the fact that God said to do it and they did.

I don’t think that’s too much to swallow.

My question is, what would Jesus know and when did he know it?

I’m not sure where the notion comes from that Jesus believed in a literal 6-day creation. I think people say that because THEY believe in a 6-day creation

I’ve heard arguments, too, about the story of Jonah being true because Jesus referenced it. However, I don’t see how that necessarily follows. If I say, “He just walked into the house and made himself at home in the same way that Goldilocks walked into the home of the three bears”, am I saying that the story of Goldilocks and the three bears is literally true? The correct answer is that you can’t form a conclusion either way about what I believe vis a vis Goldilocks. (For the record, I’m not a literal, historical Goldilockian.)

Rather, Jesus used points of reference that his listeners would understand.

To fill out the reference to Jonah — Jesus said that the Ninevites “will [not "would"] stand up and condemn” his listeners because they repented when Jonah spoke to them and his listeners didn’t. That wasn’t a hypothetical statement; it was a prediction of a future reality, which would therefore be based on a past reality, i.e., Jonah was a historical figure.

As to Jesus’ knowledge, we need to be careful lest we divide his person. A “nature” is less a persona, but a set of skills and tendencies. He is a single, unified personality, not two men in one body. As to his knowledge, I infer from the Gospels that he deliberately acted (for the most part) the way a human prophet would. Which doesn’t answer the question completely, but at least it’s a step forward.

A question we need to ask is, Were the people of Israel mistaken when they believed in a six-day creation? For I’m certain they did. The language of Genesis encourages it (e.g., “evening and morning”), and the representation of the creation week in the prescribed work week for Israel emphasizes it. Parables tend to announce themselves, usually through their context, and that kind of identification is missing in Genesis. It’s presented as the straight stuff.

We’re asking the question now, not because of something in the biblical text, but because of the volume of literature that has grown in opposition to the six-day structure, literature that I am persuaded is built on assumptions that have not been sufficiently questioned (such as the ones that underlie radiometric dating techniques). I am also not persuaded that the study of origins is meat for the scientific method (which deals with repeatable phenomena) rather than historical method (dealing with events) — and historical study has its own principles of evidence and testimony.

@ Steve and Doug – Yeah I’m not sure where they get it from either. But Jesus did create the world so however it was done, would he remember the details? It seems an odd question perhaps and not one that is a “deal breaker” of any sort. These are just the things I think about. Welcome to the inside of my head.

@ Michael – You make an interesting point about Jesus. So if he was deliberately acting as a human prophet would does that mean he withheld knowledge that he had? Not in order to be deceptive, but just because maybe his audience couldn’t handle the truth? I suppose we won’t know.

I think the creation accounts are presented more as story or myth. They talk about the ordered nature of God and I would argue that maybe things like the six day creation and one day off was a sort of mnemonic device. The early parts of the Bible were passed down orally until they were written down. I find it easy to believe that some of the stories were made mythological in order to be easy to remember. That doesn’t mean that the people in the stories weren’t real, just that I don’t see the first few books being literal histories.

You’re right about science though. Scientists make more than a few assumptions about the universe before they even get started. I don’t believe that everything evolutionists would have us believe to be true is what happened.

This is all short hand for saying that we can’t possibly know. LOL.

Fun to talk about though.